The invention relates to navigation system and more particularly to that of airplanes, space shuttles, gliders, railway trains, buses, taxis, and all other types of carriers and transportation systems.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,751,801 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An aircraft in-flight entertainment system includes a satellite TV receiver, at least one video display connected to the receiver, and a multi-beam antenna on the aircraft for receiving signals from a plurality of satellite TV transponders. The multi-beam antenna may have right-hand circularly polarized (RHCP) and left-hand circularly polarized (LHCP) beams offset from one another by a beam offset angle. The beam offset angle may be less than an angle defined by the spacing of the DBS transponders. The system may also include an antenna steering positioner connected to the multi-beam antenna, and an antenna steering controller for steering the multi-beam antenna based upon received signals from at least one of the RHCP and LHCP beams. The antenna steering controller may comprise a processor for steering the multi-beam antenna based on a selected master one of the RHCP and LHCP beams and slaving the other beam therefrom. Alternately, the processor may steer the multi-beam antenna based on a predetermined contribution from each of the RHCP and LHCP beams.’
U.S. Pat. No. 6,512,921 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A GSO satellite constellation (10) and an NGSO constellation (20) may be used to send various types of communication signals and multimedia signals to an aircraft (30). The video signals are demodulated by a demodulator (46) and routed by a router (64) to TV monitors (72 and 74), as well as short-term video storage (78). Data can be received and transmitted by a low gain, narrowband transmitter/receiver (100) in order to provide voice, computer and control communications at all times during the flight of aircraft (30).’
U.S. Pat. No. 6,208,307 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An aircraft in-flight entertainment system includes an antenna, a satellite TV receiver connected to the antenna, at least one video display connected to the satellite TV receiver, and wherein the antenna is steered using received signals from the relatively wide bandwidth from at least one satellite TV transponder, such as a direct broadcast satellite (DBS) transponder. The system may include an antenna steering positioner connected to the antenna, and an antenna steering controller comprising the received signal detector for generating a received signal strength feedback signal based upon signals from the at least one satellite TV transponder. A processor may be connected to the detector for controlling the antenna steering positioner during aircraft flight and based upon the received signal strength feedback signal. The antenna steering controller may further comprise at least one inertial rate sensor, and the processor may calibrate the sensor based upon the received signal strength feedback signal. The antenna steering controller may also include a global positioning system (GPS) receiver connected to the processor, and the processor may further calibrate the rate sensor based upon the GPS receiver.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,381,139 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A detector system for a roll-stabilized aircraft includes a hollow rotatable toroidal ring within which a suitable sensor such as a TV sensor is fixed. The sensor observes the exterior of the aircraft through an observation window in the outer peripheral wall of the ring, which can be rotated about the roll axis of the aircraft. The apparatus includes appropriate instrumentation for determining the position relative to the aircraft of an object detected by the sensor.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,195,709 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A supporting structure for supporting a TV set on an armrest of a seat of an aircraft or other vehicle so that the TV set can be turned in a vertical plane between an operating position outside a cavity formed in the front portion of the armrest and a housing position within the cavity, can be turned about a vertical axis at the operating position, and can be tilted with respect to the vertical axis. The supporting structure includes a hinge mechanism provided at the front upper end of the cavity, and a turning mechanism supported on the hinge mechanism and supporting the TV set so that the TV set can be turned at the operating position in both horizontal and vertical planes. A hinge pin included in the hinge mechanism is provided at one end with a diametrical through hole expanding toward the opposite open ends. One end of a locking pin, included in a locking mechanism, engages one of the open ends of the diametrical through hole of the hinge pin when the hinge pin is at a first predetermined angular position and engages the other open end of the diametrical through hole when the hinge pin is at a second angular position differing from the first predetermined angular position by an angle of about 180.degree. The hinge mechanism is interlocked with a shock absorbing mechanism.’
U.S. Pat. No. 4,756,528 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A video system incorporated into the back of a typical passenger seat, as on an airplane, bus, etc. The system includes a TV screen disposed normally in an upright position and recessed at least in part in the usual recess in a seat back. The arm rest of the seat next rearwardly carries various controls by means of which several modes of TV operation are available, along with the playing of music, commentaries and the like via cassettes in the arm rest, a master array of cassettes located centrally in the aircraft, disk drives, and improved power supply.’
U.S. Pat. No. 4,688,046 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An aircraft locating system identifies on a TV format radar display the position of a specific aircraft based on an RF transmission from the aircraft on an RF channel. The locating system includes at least a pair of receive stations located within several miles of an airport and separated by a base line which is in near proximity to at least one runway at the airport or a theoretical extension thereof. Each receive station includes a passive receiver for determining a bearing angle to a source of RF on the RF channel for generating a signal representative of the bearing angle. The locating system further includes a processor which is responsive to bearing angle signals derived from the receive stations for generating line count and line delay information. The line count and line delay information correlate a position determined by the bearing angle signals from at least a pair of receive stations with a frame of reference of the TV display. The system further includes a video mixer which responds to two different input signals. A first input signal to the video mixer is a scan converted radar return signal. The second input signal to the video mixer is the line count and line delay information. The output of the video mixer is used to drive a video display. The video display, subjected to the two identified inputs can highlight a location identified by the line count and line delay information so that for example a person viewing the display would be able to identify which of perhaps plural radar returns shown on the display is associated with an aircraft which is actively transmitting on the RF channel.’
U.S. Pat. No. 4,630,821 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘There is disclosed a video game apparatus to be employed by a passenger of an airplane. The apparatus includes a tray which is mounted on the rear of an airplane seat. The tray has an internal hollow with a rectangular aperture on a top surface which surface faces the passenger when the tray is placed in a usable position. Located in the rectangular aperture is a TV display screen. Located in the internal hollow of the tray is a video game apparatus which operates to provide a video game display on the surface of said TV display screen. The surface of the tray containing the TV display screen also includes a plurality of control elements which are coupled to the video game apparatus to enable the passenger to operate the game. To energize the game, the tray contains a cable coupling assembly whereby when a cable is inserted into the assembly, the video game is energized to provide a display of a game selected by means of a selector switch also mounted on the top surface of the tray.’
U.S. Pat. No. 4,135,817 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘Apparatus for measuring an aircraft's horizontal speed and height above ground without the need for airborne cooperative devices. Two ground level TV cameras separated by a measured distance and pointed at zenith are placed in line with the projection of the expected path of the aircraft. Speed is determined by measuring the time that it takes the aircraft to travel between the fields of view of the two TV cameras using zenith crossings as the reference points. Height is determined by correlating the speed with the time required to cross the field of view of either of the two cameras.’
U.S. Pat. No. 3,945,716 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A rotatable head up display system is provided to furnish target coorindate information to the pilot of an aircraft, for example. The head up display may be slaved to a FLIR or TV tracker to display the scene viewed thereby as well as the azimuth with respect to the aircraft. A small cathode ray tube is used for the display and the scene is viewed through a holographic lens so that the display appears at infinity focus. The pilot is also provided with means for controlling the aiming of the sensor (FLIR, TV, or the like).’
U.S. Patent Publication No. 20040078821 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An aircraft in-flight entertainment system preferably includes, in one embodiment, a satellite TV receiver, at least one passenger video display connected to the receiver, and a processor connected to the receiver for determining an undesired condition and for generating a substitute image on the passenger video display rather than permit display of an undesired image which would otherwise be produced. The undesired condition may relate to a weak signal or component malfunction. Accordingly, the undesired image may be an undesired default text message or a degraded picture image. Other embodiments of the in-flight entertainment system are directed to providing a moving map image flight information channel integrated with the programming channels of the system.’
U.S. Patent Publication No. 20030200547 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An aircraft in-flight entertainment system includes an adaptive antenna, a terrestrial television (TV) receiver connected to the adaptive antenna for receiving TV programming channels from more than one terrestrial TV transmitter, and at least one display connected to the terrestrial TV receiver. A controller is connected to the adaptive antenna for determining a desired terrestrial TV transmitter, and for directing the adaptive antenna towards the desired terrestrial TV transmitter. If a new desired terrestrial TV transmitter is determined by the controller, then the controller redirects the adaptive antenna towards the new desired terrestrial TV transmitter.’
U.S. Pat. No. 6,448,906 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A device uses bluetooth techniques to communicate with electronic devices in an airplane. During take off or landing, the radio on board the airplane operates in bluetooth mode to send a global poll to all devices requesting that they respond. If a device responds, then it indicates that the device is on at an unauthorized time. This informs the crew that they should try to find the unauthorized device and turn it off.’
U.S. Pat. No. 6,321,084 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘To set up a telecommunication link to a person who is in a substantially enclosed facility such as an airplane, inside which there are several internal communication transmitting terminals operated by a private branch exchange of the facility, a personal call number is assigned to a private telecommunication transmitting terminal of the person in a public telecommunication network at least during the person's stay in the facility, the assignment is stored of his/her personal call number to the internal communication transmitting terminal assigned to the person during his/her stay in the facility. A call directed to the personal call number of the person is rerouted together with the personal call number or a corresponding ID to the private branch exchange. The internal communication transmitting terminal assigned to the personal call number/ID is then determined using the stored assignment and the call is forwarded to this internal communication transmitting terminal, whereby the person remains able to be reached under his/her personal call number.’
U.S. Pat. No. 6,285,878 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A new use for the (already existing) fleets of commercial airline aircraft to replace low-earth orbit (LEO) communication satellites. This invention will provide low-cost, broadband wireless communication infrastructure among points-to-points accomplished by using and modifying existing, small, lightweight low power, low cost microwave relay station equipment onboard the commercial airline aircraft. Each equipped aircraft would have a broadband wireless communication link (within line-of-sight coverage ranges) to one or more neighboring aircraft or ground stations and form a chain of seamless airborne repeaters providing broadband wireless communication gateways along the entire flight path. Broadband wireless communication services also provide for customers onboard in-flight as well as customers overboard, along the line-of-sight ranges of flight path from the commercial airline aircraft.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,950,129 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A system and method for providing two-way in-flight radio telecommunications on board an aircraft is disclosed. The radio telecommunication system includes a Gateway Mobile Switching Center (G-MSC), an Aircraft In-flight System Controller (AISC) located on board a subscriber's aircraft, a Ground In-flight System Controller (GISC), a satellite to relay messages and calls from the GISC and AISC, and a Home Location Register (HLR) which provides routing and location information for use by the GISC and the G-MSC. In an alternate embodiment of the invention, a system and method for using a mobile phone on an aircraft is disclosed. A mobile phone is connected to a seat terminal located on an aircraft by a co-ax cable. The radio frequency (RF) signals produced by a mobile phone pass through a coax cable to an Airborne Radio Base Station (A-RBS). The A-RBS converts the RF signals into signals which do not interfere with the aircraft's navigational and communication equipment and are compatible with the GISC and multiple cellular networks. These converted signals are then transmitted via satellite to a cellular network.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,559,865 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘The airborne communication system enables one or more radiotelephones to communicate with a ground based cellular radiotelephone system. In the preferred embodiment, the aircraft is equipped with a repeater that relays a signal from the airborne radiotelephone to the ground base station and vice versa. Alternate embodiments use an airborne base station to register the radiotelephones before registering them with the ground system. Alternately, the antennas on the ground could be used to form aerial cell sites by pointing the antennas upward to where the aircraft flies through the cells. The system of the present invention provides the additional benefit of enabling the ground based cellular radio systems to source a call to the aircraft radiotelephone.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,519,761 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘The airborne radio communications system of the present invention enables an airborne radio to communicate with the ground based cellular radiotelephone system. The present invention also enables the ground based system to keep track of the location of the airborne radiotelephone and page it when a call from the ground based telephone system is received. The ground base station is connected to upward radiating antennas that form airborne cells. As the aircraft with the radio flies through the airborne cells, the airborne relay receives the signals from the base station and relays them to the radio. If the radio is transmitting signals, the relay transmits those signals, through the airborne cells, to the base station. As the aircraft moves from cell to cell, the radio is handed off to the next cell to maintain communications with the ground.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,444,762 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘Directional antennae on aircraft and on cellular telephone base stations, having a polarity opposite that of potentially interfering ground system signals, minimize signal strength of air cellular signals received by ground cellular stations. Aircraft directional antennae comprise patch antennae or vertical arrays of loop elements or vertical arrays of virtual loop elements. Additionally, air cellular signals are switched to channels not currently in use by ground cellular systems.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,408,515 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A ground-to-air telephone calling system is provided including a computer for receiving an airborne telephone number and a call-back number from a calling party and forming the telephone numbers into a data signal comporting with existing protocol filed in the FCC, an uplink unit for uplinking the data signal to a satellite and a plurality of downlink stations for receiving the data signal from the satellite; a plurality of ground stations corresponding to each of the downlink units for receiving the data signals and passing a call signal identifying the airborne telephone and particular ground station to a corresponding transmit/receive unit for subsequent transmission to the aircraft; a call being initiated from the ground station to the calling party over the public switched telephone network if the aircraft responds to the call signal. An alternative embodiment provides for a plurality of telephones on board the aircraft, and is capable of directing a call from a ground based caller to a particular telephone assigned to a passenger on the aircraft.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,123,112 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An air-to-ground communications system is described for controlling multiple two way radiotelephone conversations between a large number of aircraft (53) and a network of base stations (51) that are capable of being interconnected to landline telephone networks (54, 116). Plural base station controllers (90) of the system, each dedicated to control one base station (51), are in turn controlled by a single central processor (52). Means are provided for matching each aircraft with an optimal base station to afford it the strongest available communication signals, and for dynamically allocating communication channels between the base stations. The central processor (52) is designed to manage the system by recording and recognizing usage patterns (525-530) and allocating channels to most efficiently use the available radio spectrum among all the aircraft (517, 519).’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,073,900 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A cellular communications system is provided having both surface and satellite nodes which are fully integrated for providing service over large areas. A spread spectrum system is used with code division multiple access (CDMA) employing forward error correction coding (FECC) to enhance the effective gain and selectivity of the system. Multiple beam, relatively high gain antennas are disposed in the satellite nodes to establish the satellite cells, and by coupling the extra gain obtained with FECC to the high gain satellite node antennas, enough gain is created in the satellite part of the system such that a user need only use a small, mobile handset with a non-directional antenna for communications with both ground nodes and satellite nodes. User position information is also available. A digital data interleaving feature reduces fading.’
U.S. Pat. No. 5,067,172 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An air-to-ground communications system wherein the communicating frequency channels are assigned dependent on the amplitude of the signals received at the base sites and dependent on the altitude of the aircraft.’
U.S. Pat. No. 4,607,389 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘The present invention is a communication system for transmitting an electrical signal from a transmission tower and includes a first transceiver located adjacent the base of the tower and which is in communication with a source of an electrical signal which is to be transmitted. An enclosure is removably located adjacent the top of the tower and includes a second transceiver for receiving the transmitted electrical signal from the first transceiver and a third transceiver for retransmitting the electrical signal from the tower. By this arrangement there is no need for stringing coaxial cable from a ground based transmitter to the antenna mounted to the top of the tower, thereby eliminating the power loss associated with the use of such coaxial cable. In one embodiment of the present invention, the second and third transceivers are conveyed to and from the top of the tower via a pulley arrangement for maintenance purposes, and in an alternate embodiment, the second and third transceivers are enclosed within a housing and are conveyed to and from the top of the tower within a conduit by means of compressed air.’
U.S. Pat. No. 4,419,766 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An improved system and method for providing air/ground communications compatible with ground based telephone systems. The airborne equipment incorporates means for comparing signals received from various ground stations located along the flight path so as to allow the selection of the “best” signal to provide good telephone communications service for a reasonable length telephone conversation.’
U.S. Pat. No. 4,249,181 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘In cellular mobile radiotelephone systems employing reuse of a predetermined set of channels in adjacent iterations of a pattern of cells (FIG. 1), average signal-to-interference ratio in at least one cell region of interest is improved by tilting the antenna (11, 12) gain pattern center-beam line of an antenna serving that region below the horizontal (FIG. 3). In one embodiment the tilt (.theta.) is sufficient to create a reduced-gain notch (FIG. 8) in the center-beam portion of the pattern.’
U.S. Patent Publication No. 20020160773 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘A system for permitting passengers on board an aircraft to send and receive electronic data is described. The components of the system on board the aircraft include a server having a plurality of nodes to which computer terminals are attached, as desired. The components of the system on board the aircraft include a wireless access point having a plurality nodes, where the wireless access point is attached to the server and to a plurality of wireless cards inserted into computer terminals, as desired. The computer terminals are laptop or palm-top personal computers belonging to the various passengers on board or fixed terminals within the aircraft. The server communicates with a wide variety of different terminals running different operating systems and with the access point. Each computer terminal is connected to the server via an aircraft cable or wireless network. Server has mass storage which contains a database of WWW pages which can be browsed by passengers using terminals. Server provides a domain name server (DNS) that masquerades as the passenger's usual DNS. Server then links the passenger to the appropriate locally stored WWW page. Server also contains storage for e-mail messages. Connected to server is one or more radios. This permits data to be transferred to base station using communications network. A virtual private network (VPN) connects station to communications service provider networks, web content processor, and via links to the Internet, including access to subscriber ISPs/corporate mail servers and other mail servers. Points of Presence (POP) provide Internet access and e-mail service to subscribers of the service while not on the aircraft. POPs can also be used by communications service provider networks and web content processors as an alternate means to connect to VPN.’
U.S. Patent Publication No. 20020168975 is introduced as a prior art of the present invention of which the summary is the following: ‘An electronic communication system for use onboard an aircraft includes a server and a plurality of input ports for connection with passenger computing devices. Passengers can send and retrieve electronic messages (e-mail and/or attachments) using a proxy-based web server access to the user's own e-mail service provider. The system receives proxy-based commands from the user's computing device and translates those commands into web-based commands that enable communication with the passenger's e-mail accounts. The passenger may send e-mail communications by composing a message on the passenger computing device and sending it via the web-based proxy server. E-mail messages may also be retrieved from one or more passenger e-mail accounts. In one embodiment, the system transmits only e-mail summary information to the airborne server and provides the summary information to the passenger. The passenger may select one or more e-mails and/or attachments for subsequent retrieval, thus limiting passenger expense for retrieval of unwanted or unnecessary e-mails and/or attachments. The system may also display cost information associated with uploading the e-mail and/or attachments to enable the passenger to select those desired messages for subsequent transmission.’
However, the foregoing pieces prior art do not disclose the vehicle, such as airplane, which comprises the internal wireless communicating device and the external antenna device, wherein the passenger(s) in the vehicle may access network (e.g., the Internet) via the internal wireless communicating device and the external antenna device.